In the Acts of the Apostles, there's a relevant passage about converting the Gentiles (non-Jewish people). James has this to say:
It is my judgment, therefore, that we ought to stop troubling the Gentiles who turn to God, but tell them by letter to avoid pollution from idols, unlawful marriage, the meat of strangled animals, and blood.All of the legalisms of Judaism are replaced by a few, simple rules* so that the Church can concentrate on what's important. Had they not done this, they would have first had to convert the Gentiles to Judaism and then from there to Christianity. Judaism would have been the undergraduate degree and Christianity the graduate degree. Clearly, that's not what they did, that's not what we do and not what we preach.
Ergo, the Old Testament verses flung thither and yon are not the snares some make them out to be.
* - We don't worry so much about strangled animals or blood any more.
13 comments:
I've listened to lots of people of faith argue what they believe and why, and when it comes to Christianity, you don't have to go far before you start hearing about how the Bible is the inspired "Word of God". So I guess my first question is, do you believe that the Bible is divinely inspired in whole, in part, or not at all?
We've been pondering this issue for about 2000 years with stellar intellects like St. Thomas Aquinas and St, Augustine. It's not the sort of question you hash out in a stream of blog comments. Right now, I'm reading three things at the same time which might help you.
1. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire for context
2. The Acts of the Apostles for the detail-level description of the evangelization after the resurrection
3. The Catechism of the Catholic Church for the synthesis of the concepts.
The Catechism can be had quite easily, just download the Laudate app on your phone and it's included.
If you'd like to learn more, you can go in any number of directions as we've got mountains of deep thought on the concepts.
Incidentally, I really appreciated your Leviticus snippet. It helped me to do some things I should have done decades ago - read the Acts and go through that part of the Catechism.
That's a respectable amount of scholarship, and is vastly better than the "God said it, I believe it, that settles it" sentiment that gets thrown around far too often.
But here's my problem. In the case of Christianity, you have centuries and centuries of editing, translation, debate, schism, reformation, etc, etc, and it all ultimately centers around some 66 texts that were written down by humans. We have varying degrees of certainty as to who the authors were. The don't all seem to agree (e.g. how did Judas die?). And in the case of some of the arguably most important books (i.e. the Gospels) they were written decades after the events they describe, at best.
So I guess my question is this. We have this vast body of thought on the subject, and yet it all boils down to what is essentially centuries old anecdotal evidence describing incredibly extraordinary events. How can this ever come remotely close to satisfying any kind of reasonable standard of evidence?
Or to rephrase it as I've heard it sometimes snarkily put, "the plural of anecdote is not data", no matter how much analysis or scholarship it's been given.
Anon: "But here's my problem..."
Your problem is not a problem for me. It may surprise you to know that, as a devout Catholic and scientist, I couldn't care less about what your problem is. Any problem(s) you may have are almost surely not going to be resolved on the internet. And, as KT noted, these are not issues that get resolved in a comment thread. I know that, and unless you are a slack-jawed, stump-toothed idiot, you know that. So, giving you the benefit of the doubt, I'm detecting the reek of a troll.
If you really have a problem with faith that you're looking to get fixed, as opposed to looking for an opportunity to troll, I suggest you go pray or contact the local church of your choice.
Actually, no, you're incorrect. I thought I might try to gain some insight into a worldview that's clearly different from my own.
Trigger Warning: It's kind of amusing that you are accusing Anonymous of being a "troll", given the nature of the post. KT isn't exactly "trolling" (what he's doing is more like still-fishing from his private pier), but his post was still pretty much bait specifically intended to catch fish like "Anonymous", here.
anon: "If you really have a problem with faith that you're looking to get fixed, as opposed to looking for an opportunity to troll, I suggest you go pray or contact the local church of your choice."
Tim, I always try to be amusing. And you're right, KT wasn't trolling. So, as far as I am concerned, that's the end of it. I'm just curious, Tim... in your experience, are knotty issues of theology and faith resolved in comment threads? If so, please direct me to those threads. I'd like to see it for myself.
"in your experience, are knotty issues of theology and faith resolved in comment threads?"
No, but then, in my experience they aren't resolved by consulting with priests or theologians either. I've read a lot of St.Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine (partially on my own, and partially as a result of KT's recommendations), and find them to be primarily very adept at dodging the issues in such a way that one doesn't immediately notice what they are doing, and providing a lot of answers to questions that aren't actually the ones being asked.
So, if one really must discuss such things, comment threads on blogs are not really any less constructive places to do it than anywhere else.
Tim: "'in your experience, are knotty issues of theology and faith resolved in comment threads?'
No..."
My point exactly.
Moreover, your issues with Aquinas or Augustine are irrelevant to my point, or any previous point, and not interesting to me in any event. I'm more impressed by the University of Chicago's inclusion of both authors in the Great Books of the Western World list. Nobody ever said those authors were easy. Try "Aquinas for Dummies".
"So, if one really must discuss such things, comment threads on blogs are not really any less constructive places to do it than anywhere else."
Brilliant deduction. I suppose we can close the universities and go home now.
Bad link.
Great books: http://bit.ly/1EWJzYC
So, Trigger Warning, it sounds to me like you are saying that KT should shut up and stop posting about such subjects, because discussing them on blogs is useless. Or are you saying that when he does, nobody should comment on it?
Are those my only two choices?
look here
:-D
I'm done.
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